Storage and Disposal of Nuclear Waste

What does one do with the radioactive waste described in the previous section Clearly, the most important component of the waste is the spent fuel. Currently, most spent fuel assemblies are held in cooling ponds at the reactor sites, although one cannot do this indefinitely. In a few reactor sites, dry storage of the spent fuel is used. The fuel rods are transferred to special casks when the heat output and activity are such that air cooling will suffice. 

Because a permanent disposal strategy has proven illusive due to technical and political considerations, plans have been made for interim storage facilities where 

The favored method for permanent storage of radioactive waste is deep geologic repositories. This option is the only option for unprocessed spent fuel assemblies and for most HLW. (An alternative, supplemental strategy discussed below is to remove some of the actinides in the HLW by chemical separations prior to geologic storage.) 

In general terms, the goal of long-term waste storage is to isolate the radioactive waste from humans and the environment. The prevailing design strategy for waste repositories is that of multiple barriers (Fig. 16.12). 

The first barrier is the form of the waste, which will immobilize the radioactive materials. The waste form should not be damaged by heat or radiation nor be attacked by groundwater. The waste is placed in a steel canister, which is resistant to leaching. The canister is surrounded by packing materials that prevent radioactivity from escaping, and the entire repository is backfilled with a material that absorbs or resists chemical intrusion. The final barrier is the host medium that separates the repository from the surrounding area. 

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King, F. (2013) Container materials for the storage and disposal of nuclear waste. Corrosion, 69,986-1011. 

Storage and disposal of nuclear waste pose important concerns. 

Research and evaluate environmental issues regarding the storage, containment, and disposal of nuclear wastes. 

Discuss some of the problems associated with the storage and disposal of the waste products of the nuclear industry. 

Radioactive waste management involves the treatment, storage, and disposal of liquid, airborne, and solid effluents from the nuclear industry s operations, along with those from other activities that employ the radioactive products. Its strategy involves four approaches limit generation, delay and decay, concentrate and contain, and dilute and disperse. Combinations of all four of these usually are employed to manage each waste stream.39... 

However no development of nuclear power industry is possible without appropriate solution of a variety of complex and expensive problems related to transportation, storage, processing and disposal of radioactive waste generated during both normal operation and decommissioning of nuclear facilities including Nuclear Submarines (NS). 

New applications are being developed for lead and lead compounds in microelectronics, superconductors, asphalt, earthquake damping materials and radon gas shielding, and for retrievable storage or permanent disposal of nuclear waste (OECD, 1993). 

There is, finally, a fourth and perhaps most important factor which renders a deliberate approach toward the use of fission energy imperative the attendant production of vast amounts of radioactive materials. The storage and disposal of these materials will present many problems, the solution of which will have to be based on protracted practical experience. Not many mistakes can be allowed while the proposed solutions are tried out. If there were no other reasons for developing some nuclear power fast, the difficulty and urgency of the problem of the disposal of radioactive wastes would be an adequate reason. 

In addition to the risk of accidents, the problem of radioactive waste disposal has not been satisfactorily resolved even for safely operated nuclear plants. Many suggestions have been made as to where to store or dispose of nuclear waste, including burial underground, burial beneath the ocean floor, and storage in deep geologic formations. None... 

Low-level wastes from these "civilian" sources are currently disposed in three shallow land burial sites. One is in the eastern United States, and two are in the West. Progress in developing new disposal edacity continues to be made as the Department looks with anticipation to the opening of a fourth site at Ward Valley site in the California desert. Treatment, storage and disposal of these low-level wastes are licensed by a Federal commission some of you may be familiar with, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

Thorium, uranium, and plutonium are well known for their role as the basic fuels (or sources of fuel) for the release of nuclear energy (5). The importance of the remainder of the actinide group Hes at present, for the most part, in the realm of pure research, but a number of practical appHcations are also known (6). The actinides present a storage-life problem in nuclear waste disposal and consideration is being given to separation methods for their recovery prior to disposal (see Waste treati nt, hazardous waste Nuclear reactors, waste managet nt). 

At present, no country in the world has yet implemented a system for permanently disposing of the spent fuel (Deutch and Moniz, 2006). Since 1979, a salt dome in Gorleben (northern Germany) has been under investigation for final storage of nuclear waste. In 2000, a moratorium stopped the work for a period of three to ten years. To date, around 1.3 billion have been invested in the Gorleben project. 

In common with the programs of other countries, AECL intends to develop and demonstrate the technology for the disposal of radioactive waste produced in the operation of nuclear electric generating stations. Two basic options are available as shown in Figure 1. Following storage either at the reactor sites or at a central storage facility one may ... 

One of the most important applications of nuclear and radiochemistry is in the area of nuclear power. Chemistry and chemical processes are intimately involved in reactor operation, the preparation and processing of reactor fuel, and the storage and ultimate disposal of radioactive waste. In this chapter, we shall examine some of the most important chemistry associated with nuclear power. 

Spent nuclear fuel is a form of high-level waste in some definitions [e.g., NRC s 10 CFR Part 60 (NRC, 1983)] but not in others [e.g., the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA, 1982)]. This inconsistency is not important, because spent fuel and the primary waste from fuel reprocessing have similar radiological properties and require similar precautions for safe handling, storage, and disposal. Spent fuel is not a waste until it is so declared. 

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